On 2 April 1799, the M.P. for Southwark, the
wealthy banker and evangelical philanthropist Henry Thornton, wrote to the
under-secretary in the Home Office, William Wickham, passing on information
given to him by a Battersea distiller named Benwell. One of Benwell's employees
had recently been asked to join a society which met at Wandsworth. If he joined,
he would have to swear a secret oath. He would `get a shilling for every
attendance at the society, of which he would have to expend 6d at the place of
meeting'. He would receive a further 2s 6d for every new member he introduced to
the society. Thornton and Benwell were convinced that this was a cell of the
subversive organisation known as the United Englishmen. Thornton had urged
Benwell to work with a local magistrate to find out the names of all the members
of this mysterious Wandsworth club. Thornton ended his letter to Wickham by
assuring him of his willingness to assist in `detecting the secret societies
which may infest the parts around us'. Wickham passed on Thornton's information
to the Home Secretary, the Duke of Portland. The Duke thanked Thornton for this
intelligence, since the Home Office was uncertain of the exact strength of the
United Englishmen. The news that money was being offered as an inducement to
join was particularly interesting. The Duke suggested that Benwell should
encourage his employee to join the group, so that he could give the Home Office
information about it.[ii]

This exchange encapsulates the atmosphere of
late 1798 and 1799, when seditious societies bound by secret oaths, the
harbingers of a French invasion, were seen round every corner.[iii]
This atmosphere created a groundswell of support for the passage in July 1799 of
one of the most sweeping of the legislative measures introduced by Pitt's
government to forestall the threat of revolution. This act, `An act for the more
effectual suppression of societies established for seditious and treasonable
purposes; and for the better preventing treasonable and seditious practices',[iv]
to give its full name, was, almost by accident, to form the mainstay of the
relationship between freemasonry and the state in Britain for nearly two hundred
years, until its repeal by the Criminal Justice Act of 1967.[v]

One of the most important of the radical
bodies which emerged in Britain in the wake of the French Revolution was the
United Irishman, a `United Society of the Irish nation; to make all Irishmen
citizens - all citizens Irishmen', which was established in 1791.[vi]
Its initial aims were catholic emancipation and radical parliamentary reform; by
1796 it had become an avowedly republican movement. The United Irish sent
embassies to France to seek support for an uprising and independence, but the
French and United Irish failed effectively to coordinate their efforts. In 1796,
the French landed at Bantry Bay, but did not give the United Irish any advance
warning; two years later, the French were in turn caught by surprise by an Irish
rebellion and failed to provide adequate military support. The arrests of United
Irish leaders which had helped precipitate the rebellion and the fierce
repression of the rising left the United Irishmen a much diminished movement.

In England, the most prominent of the
radical bodies which sprang up after 1789 was the London Corresponding Society.
In 1794, a number of its leaders were arrested and tried for treason. These
trials were unsuccessful, but subsequent legislation and internal difficulties
had by 1797 reduced the influence of the L.C.S. From this time, an increasingly
close alliance developed between Irish republican movements and those on the
British mainland, with the formation of societies of United Englishmen and
United Scotsmen on the Irish model. Some of the remaining members of the L.C.S.
played an important part in the United movement in Britain. Further impetus was
given to the United societies by Irish migrants active in Manchester and other
parts of the north-west.

Despite the great blows suffered by the
republican movement in 1798 as a result of the arrest of much of its leadership
and the failure of the Irish revolt, Pitt's government remained uncertain of the
real strength of the United bodies and was worried that they were regrouping.
Shortly before Christmas 1798, the opposition Whigs accused Pitt of justifying
repressive measures by scare mongering. Pitt responded by declaring that, if
need be, the truth of his allegations could be proved.[vii]The following month, parliamentary committees were appointed to examine
secret evidence held by the government and to report back to parliament on the
nature of the threat.[viii]
The House of Commons secret committee reported on 15 March 1799.[ix]
It declared that, from the documents shown to it by the government, it had found
the `clearest proofs of a systematic design, long since adopted and acted upon
by France, in conjunction with domestic traitors...to overturn the laws,
constitution and government, and every existing establishment, civil or
ecclesiastical, both in Great Britain and Ireland, as well as to dissolve the
connection between the two kingdoms...' The secret committee went on to state
that `The most effectual engine employed for this purpose has been the
institution of political societies, of a nature and description before unknown
in any country, and inconsistent with public tranquillity and with the existence
of public government'.

The report described the various United
bodies and their connections with the London Corresponding Society. It
emphasised their use of `an oath of fidelity and secrecy' to `form themselves,
under the eye and in defiance of government, into one body, compactedby one bond of union'. The report described how these societies
`principally carried on their intercourse by agents, who went from place to
place, and were recognized by signs, which were frequently changed'. The
documentary appendix of the report included examples of membership certificates
issued by London divisions of the United Irish, certifying that the bearer had
passed various tests. Equally alarming to the committee was the organisational
structure of these groups. The elaborate hierarchy of the United Irish, with
their overall executive directory and subordinate baronial, district and county
committees, was described in detail. The appendix reprinted the rules of various
United groups in full. In the view of the secret committee, a sinister feature
of these organisations was that the forms of election used meant that the
membership as a whole did not know the composition of the executive committee.

The report noted how previous legislation
had restricted subversive lectures and meetings, but added that `many of the
debating societies, which subsist at the present time, appear, to your committee,
to be, in great measure, directed to the same pernicious objects, and to require
further animadversion and correction'. Likewise, the committee was concerned
about `the establishment of clubs, among the lowest classes of the community,
which were open to all persons paying one penny, and in which songs were sung,
toasts given, and language held, of the most seditious nature'. The secret
committee also called for further restrictions on the press, which it consideredexcessively licentious.

The trustworthiness of the information in
the secret committee's report has been hotly debated for a long time.[x]
The most trenchant criticisms were made in the 1820s by the radical and former
member of the L.C.S., Francis Place, in his Autobiography.[xi]Place singled out as particularly ludicrous the claims of the secret
committee that there were forty divisions of United Englishmen in London. In
Place's view, the United Englishmen in London amounted to no more than a few
disreputable hot-heads, egged on by government spies.[xii]
However, Place was anxious to demonstrate his own respectability and to show
that the L.C.S. in its early days was a force for moral improvement. Moreover,
he was based in London and was not well-informed about conditions in
north-western England, Scotland and Ireland.[xiii]
Whatever the truth of the allegations of the secret committee, its political
consequences can be more easily established.

On 19 April 1799, the House of Commons
debated the report of its secret committee. Pitt rose to announce the measures
proposed by his government.[xiv]
The suspension of Habeas Corpus was to continue, and powers would be sought to
move prisoners about the country as the government sought fit. Pitt continued:
`we must proceed still farther, now that we are engaged in a most important
struggle with the restless and fatal spirit of Jacobinism, assuming new shapes,
and concealing its malignant and destructive designs under new forms and new
practices. In order to oppose it with effect, we must also from time to time
adopt new modes, and assume new shapes'. Not only should the societies mentioned
by name in the secret committee's report, the L.C.S., the United Irish, the
United Britons, the United Scotsmen and the United Englishmen, be suppressed,
but all societies of this type should be made unlawful. Pitt described the
characteristics of the societies he wanted to outlaw: `These marks are, wicked
and illegal engagements of mutual fidelity and secrecy by which the members are
bound; the secrecy of electing the members; the secret government and conduct of
the affairs of the society; secret appointments unknown to the bulk of the
members; presidents and committees, which, veiling themselves from the general
mass and knowledge of the members, plot and conduct the treason - I propose that
all societies which administer such oaths shall be declared unlawful
confederacies...' Noting the remarks of the secret committee about debating
clubs, Pitt also proposed that all meetings where money was taken at the door
should require a magistrate's licence.[xv]
The final part of the measures proposed by Pitt were major new restrictions on
printers. All publications should in future bear the name of their author and
publisher. A general register was to be established of all printing presses,
including those owned by private individuals.

George Tierney, the effective leader of the
Foxite opposition in the Commons who in the previous year had fought a duel with
Pitt[xvi], replied. He criticised
the report of the secret committee, declaring that he `never saw a report made
to this House that was so little supported by the evidence'. He complained that
the proposed law would give undue power to the crown, and breed an army of spies
and informers. He pointed out that the effect of such a bill would be `to pull
down every club in the country', since most clubs took some kind of money and
would come within the scope of the proposed legislation. Tierney's greatest
concern, however, were the restrictions on printers, which he thought worse than
an imprimatur. He could never support
such measures: `I had rather be subjected to the most bitter reproaches and
malicious statements for the remainder of my days, than have the press limited
to the extent to which this goes'.

Despite Tierney's opposition, a motion was
passed to bring a bill to implement these measures, and the bill was duly
published the next day,[xvii]
receiving its first reading in the Commons on 22 April.[xviii]
This bill outlawed the L.C.S., United Englishmen, United Scotsmen, United
Irishmen and United Britons by name. It also defined as an unlawful combination
and confederacy `every society, the members whereof shall...be required or
admitted to take any oath or engagement...' Societies were required to admit
members `by open declaration at a public meeting of such society'. Every society
was required to keep a book containing the names of all its officers, committees
and members, which was to be open to inspection by the entire membership.
Membership or support of any society which breached these regulationswould be a criminal offence. Magistrates acting on the word of a single
informer could impose summary fines on offenders; where offenders were indicted
by jury and tried in a higher court, the punishment was transportation.

Any premises on which public meetings or
lectures were held (apart from universities and properly constituted schools)
required a magistrate's licence, even if the premises in question consisted of
an open field. Similar licences were also required by reading rooms which
charged for admission. The most elaborate provisions of the bill were the
restrictions on printing. Anyone possessing a printing press or even type was
required to register with the clerk of the peace, who would forward the
information to the Home Office. Vendors of printing presses and type had to keep
full accounts, open for inspection by a Justice of the Peace. The names and
addresses of printers were to appear on the title and end papers of all books.
Printers were to keep an archive of all their publications. The sellers of
publications which breached these regulations could be summarily arrested.[xix]
It was these restrictions on the press which attracted most criticism of the
bill when it came to its second reading in the Commons on 30 April.[xx]

Such wide-ranging legislation was bound to
create problems by inadvertently catching in its net harmless and respectable
activities. Many of these difficulties became apparent when the bill came to
committee on 6 May.[xxi]
The restrictions on lectures created difficulties for such places as the Inns of
Court and Chancery, and exemptions for these were added to the bill. Exclusions
from the restrictions on printers were inserted for the King's printer and the
two university presses. The kind of absurd situation to which the bill could
potentially give rise was illustrated by one exchange in which an M.P. asked
`whether astronomical lectures came under the exempting clauses, as the Justices
were not compelled, but only allowed to grant licences'. Pitt replied that such
occasions `might be made a cloak for seditious lectures'. The M.P. was not
convinced, but the government was adamant that no such exemption could be
permitted. When the bill came to receive its third reading on 9 May, it was
belatedly realised that parliament itself could fall foul of the regulations on
printers, and a clause was hastily added `by way of Ryder, declaring that the
Provisions of the Bill shall not extend to Papers printed by Order of either
House of Parliament'.[xxii]

One major difficulty which had become
apparent was the position of freemasons. The provisions of the bill against the
use of secret oaths in societies potentially placed freemasons in a difficult
position, although arguably these oaths were outside the scope of bill since
they were not seditious.[xxiii]
More problematic was the requirement that initiations should take place in a
public meeting. The grand lodges must also have been uneasily aware that they
did not have a comprehensive register of members of the sort required by the
bill, and that the compilation and distribution of such a register would have
been an enormous undertaking.

The two English Grand Lodges and the
Scottish Grand Lodge had quickly taken action to try and deal with these
problems before the bill got to committee. On 30 April, the day on which the
bill received its second reading, Pitt received a request for a meeting with
masonic representatives, and a delegation went to Downing Street on 2 May.[xxiv]
The masonic representatives included Lord Moira, Acting Grand Master of the
Grand Lodge of England, the Duke of Atholl, Grand Master of the Ancients' Grand
Lodge and Past Grand Master Mason of Scotland, as well as other grand officers.[xxv]
The most important official record of this meeting is a note in the minute book
of the Hall Committee of the Modern Grand Lodge, reporting that the Prime
Minister had `expressed his good opinion of the Society and said he was willing
to recommend any clause to prevent the new act from affecting the Society,
provided that the name of the society could be prevented from being made use of
as a cover by evilly disposed persons for seditious purposes'.[xxvi]
William White, Grand Secretary of the Moderns, afterwards recalled the meeting
in similar terms, recalling that Pitt `paid many compliments to the Society and
said there was no imputation against its conduct, and that it was only wished to
adopt some regulations to prevent the name of our Society from being perverted
by bad people to a cover for their machinations against the government'.[xxvii] Lord Moira also
subsequently recalled how `I have pledged myself to His Majesty's ministers that
should any set of men attempt to meet as a lodge without sanction, the Grand
Master, or Acting Grand Master (whomsoever he might be), would apprise
parliament'.[xxviii]
Pitt himself reported to the House of Commons that the freemasons `were very
ready to acquiesce in any security the legislature would require from them for
the tranquillity of the state'.[xxix]

However, it seems that Pitt probably also
pointed out that the government had worrying information which suggested that
the masons needed to be more vigilant. Among the documents which had been shown
to the secret committee was a letter sent to the Home Office by John Waring, a
catholic priest at Stonyhurst, who described how an Irishman named Bernard Kerr
had told him he was `a freemason, a Knight Templar, and belonged to a society of
people who called themselves United Englishmen'. Kerr had shown him the printed
rules of the United Englishmen, which he kept in a large portfolio together with
his papers of admission as a Knight Templar.[xxx]
These concerns about connections between the United bodies and freemasonry were
not idle. Many of the United Irishmen were freemasons and many features of their
organisation, such as the use of oaths and secret signs, were drawn from masonic
models.[xxxi]

Moreover, the problems were not restricted
to Irish masons. On 17 April, shortly before Pitt met the masonic deputation,
James Greene, a freemason and lawyer staying in Leeds, wrote to the Home
Secretary, describing a meeting of a lodge at Leeds. `Being no stranger to the
disaffected principles of too many in this place and especially among the lower
class of freemasons', he wrote, `I made it a point to visit a lodge of that
class; and tho' politics are never introduced while the lodge is sitting, it
became a topic out of the lodge when a part of the fraternity withdrew from the
lodge room to supper, when a shrewd sensible fellow began to inveigh against the
measures of the government, and spoke in very high terms in favour of the
Cannibalian government in France, to which I exhibited a seeming
pleasure. After the lodge was over, and since, I got a great deal of information
from him by seeming to be one of that infernal class, and being desirous
to obtain more, I begged to see him as often as he could make it convenient to
talk matters over. He called upon me several times at my lodgings, and having
given credit to the seeming sincerity of my attachment to that
they call the cause, and confiding in my secrecy as a free mason,
produced a letter from one of the leaders among the United Irishmen,
dated Dublin the 31st of March ult[im]o.' This letter referred to a major United
meeting which was to take place, under cover of a masonic gathering, at Paisley
in Scotland. Greene concluded his letter as follows: `Now my Lord, if your Grace
will approve of it, as I am in the higher orders of masonry, and as I have every
reason to believe that I can be of signal service in this matter, I will very
readily undertake to conduct matters as occasion may serve so as to nip the evil
in the bud, or let it run to such a length as may come to a riper maturity, and
tho' there are too many rotten of the Craft fraternity, I can with great
truth aver that the general part of the mass are strictly loyal'.[xxxii]

The aftermath of Pitt's meeting with the
masonic delegation suggests that he gave them the gist of the information
received from Greene. Although it seems that the lodge in Leeds was not an
Antient lodge, it was the Antients who took these concerns most seriously,
perhaps because of their greater strength in the north-western industrial towns,
where the United groups were strongest, and their closer connections with Irish
masonry. Immediately after the meeting with Pitt, the Grand Officers of the
Antients met at the Crown and Anchor Tavern in the Strand. They agreed to
recommend two emergency measures. The first was `to inhibit and totally prevent
all public masonic processions, and all private meetings of masons, or lodges of
emergency, upon any pretence whatever, and to suppress and suspend all masonic
meetings, except upon the regular stated lodge meetings and Royal Arch chapters,
which shall be held open to all masons to visit, duly qualified as such'. It was
also agreed `that when the usual masonic business is ended, the lodge shall then
disperse, the Tyler withdraw from the door, and formality and restraint of
admittance shall cease'. These two measures were formally approved on 6 May at a
Grand Lodge of Emergency, with theDuke
of Atholl himself in the chair.[xxxiii]

The actions of the Antients and the
assurances given to Pitt convinced him that the Grand Lodges were determined to
ensure that freemasonry could not be used as a front for radical activity, and
at the committee stage of the bill Pitt himself accordingly introduced
amendments to exempt them from the act.[xxxiv]
He proposed what was essentially a system of self-regulation operated by the
Grand Lodges. The relevant clause read as follows:

`...nothing in this act contained shall
extend, or be construed to extend, to prevent the meetings of the Lodge or
society of persons which is now held at Free Masons Hall in Great Queen Street
in the County of Middlesex, and usually denominated The Grand Lodge of
Freemasons of England, or of the Lodge or society of persons usually denominated
The Grand Lodge of Masons of England, according to the Old Institution, or of
the Lodge or society of persons which is now held at Edinburgh, and usually
denominated The Grand Lodge of Free Masons of Scotland, or the meetings of any
subordinate lodge or society of persons usually calling themselves Free Masons,
the holding whereof shall be sanctioned or approved by any one of the above
mentioned lodges or societies...'[xxxv]

The amendment envisaged a system whereby the
Grand Secretaries would each year deposit with the clerks of the peace a
certificate containing details of the time and place of meeting of all approved
lodges in the county, together with a declaration that the lodges were approved
by the Grand Master. All lodges were to keep a book in which each member was to
declare, on joining, `that he is well affected to the constitution and
government of this realm, by King, Lords, and Commons, as by law established'.
This book was to be kept open for inspection by local magistrates. The Grand
Lodges were thus to be made responsible for policing freemasonry; lodges whose
names did not appear on the return made by the Grand Secretaries would be
criminal conspiracies.

It was in this form that the bill went to
the House of Lords, where it received its first reading on 10 May and its second
on 3 June.[xxxvi]
The bill went into committee in the House of Lords on 5 June. The debate was
lead by the Foreign Secretary, Lord Grenville. Much of the debate consisted of a
detailed consideration of the regulations for the control of printing types and
the effects of the legislation on catholic and non-conformist schools. A number
of amendments were passed, the most notable of which was that the Gresham
College lectures should enjoy the same immunity as the universities and Inns of
Court.[xxxvii] No amendments were
made to the clauses concerning freemasons, but concern was expressed about them
in the course of the debate. Lord Grenville himself observed that `With respect
to the clause adopted by the other house of parliament for exempting societies
of freemasons from the operations of the bill...,though he did not mean to
propose setting it aside, yet it did not appear to him to be fraught with that
clearness and certainty which he could wish. He was free to express his belief,
that whatever the conduct of masonic societies in foreign countries might be (where
in some instances designs of the most destructive tendency were brought to
perfection) these societies in this country harboured no designs inimical to the
state, or suffered or entertained such in their lodges. Yet what the clause
provided was of an anomalous nature, and new to the functions of parliament. The
officers, & c., of the subordinate lodges were to be approved by the grand
master and others of the principal lodges before they could be entitled to hold
their meetings. Now, how such officers, who were to have the licensing power,
were to be constituted and appointed, that house, as a legislative assembly,
knew nothing. It was not his own intent to propose any specific amendment to the
clause; he only throw out the observation, in order that other lords, more
conversant in such matters, might if they were willing, come forward and suggest
something...'[xxxviii]

Grenville thus felt that the idea of
self-regulation raised serious constitutional difficulties; it seemed to him
inappropriate that Grand Officers should be given statutory authority
effectively to license masonic lodges when parliament itself had no control over
how those grand officers were appointed. The Duke of Norfolk, declaring himself
to be a mason, expressed some alarm at Grenville's remarks and `deplored the
idea of setting aside the exempting clause, as tending to their annihilation.'
Grenville assured Norfolk that he was not proposing removing the clauses, just
asking for a better method of regulating lodges. Norfolk was unable to suggest a
new formulation and proposed instead that the act last only for a year, which
was unacceptable to Grenville.[xxxix]
The clauses concerning the freemasons survived the committee stage in the House
of Lords, but the concerns raised by Grenville were soon to resurface and
present a serious threat to freemasonry.

On 20 June, the bill came up for its third
reading in the House of Lords.[xl]
The first speaker in the debate was the pedantic and cantankerous Earl of Radnor,[xli]
who proposed an amendment to drop the exemptions for freemasons. He said that
`Not being himself a mason, and having heard that they administered oaths of
secrecy, he did not know, whether in times so critical as the present, it was
wise to trust the freemasons any more than any other meetings'. He went on to
add that `their meetings were, in other countries at least, made subservient to
the purposes of those illuminati who
had succeeded in the overthrow of one great government, and were labouring for
the destruction of all others. This he conceived to have been proved in a work
some time since published by a very learned Professor (Dr Robinson), and he was
desirous to guard against any similar practices in this country'.[xlii]
It seems that this was the first point at which Robison's famous 1797
anti-masonic work was mentioned by name in the course of the discussion of the
1799 legislation.

The Duke of Atholl responded to Radnor, and,
in the words of the report in The Senator
`defended with great earnestness and ability the institutions of freemasonry'.[xliii]
The fullest account of his speech is in The
Senator, and is worth quoting at length:

`The
Noble Duke contended, that the imputations thrown upon freemasons by the Noble
Earl, on the authority of a recent publication, however justified by the conduct
of the lodges on the continent, were by no means applicable to those of Great
Britain. His Grace avowed, that the proceedings in masonic lodges, and all their
obligation to secrecy simply related to their own peculiar little tenets and
matters of form. There were no set of men in the kingdom, and he had the best
opportunities of knowing, having had the honour to preside over a great part of
them in England as well as in Scotland, who could possibly be more loyal or
attached to the person of their sovereign or the cause of their country. There
was nothing in the masonic institution hostile to the law, the religion or the
established government of the country; on the contrary, they went to support all
these, and no person who was not a loyal or religious man could be a good mason.
Of those well established facts perhaps the Noble Earl was ignorant in
consequence of his not being a mason, but they were strictly true: added to
these considerations, the masonic system was founded on the most exalted system
of benevolence, morals, and charity, and many thousands were annually relieved
by the charitable benevolence of masons. These very laudable and useful
charities must necessarily be quashed did the bill pass into a law, as
recommended by the Noble Earl. The very nature and foundation of freemasonry
involved in them the most unshaken attachment to religion, unsuspected loyalty
to sovereigns, and the practice of morality and benevolence, in the strictest
sense of the words. To such regulations as went to prevent the perversion of
their institution to the purposes of seditious conspiracy, he could have no
objection, and as a proof of the readiness with which they would be acceded to
by the masonic societies, he need only mention that this subject had occupied
their attention for several years past...'

The Bishop of Rochester, Samuel Horsley, who
produced a famous edition of Newton's works and was a former secretary of the
Royal Society, spoke next. He declared that he was `a member of the branch of
masonry which existed in Scotland' and agreed with everything the Duke of Atholl
had said: `the innocence of these [masonic] institutions was unquestionable, and
other objects which it embraced were of the most laudable nature'. However, this
applied only to genuine and regular lodges inBritain and was not, in his view, true on the continent.
There was a risk that continental influences could affect freemasonry in Britain:
`As secrecy was absolutely necessary,no
person could say that the doctrine of innovation, which had diffused itself on
the continent, had not found its way into this country'. The Bishop reminded the
House that Robison had calculated that there were no less than eight illuminated
lodges in Britain. He felt torn between his loyalties as a mason and his duty as
a legislator, but in the end his obligations as a member of the House of Lords
required him to support Lord Radnor, since `By the bill as it then stood, the
meetings of such lodges were sanctioned, or were approved by persons appointed
they knew not how, or by whom; by individuals, however respectable they might be
as such, of whom they, as a House of Parliament, had no cognizance'. In other
words, the Bishop felt, as Grenville had earlier, that a responsible parliament
should not countenance a system of self-regulation by the grand lodges.

What happened next is not clear. According
to one account, Radnor's amendment was passed, and freemasonry in Britain was
within an ace of becoming a criminal conspiracy.[xliv]
Whatever the exact sequence of events, the day was saved by Lord Grenville.
Grenville proposed substituting the clause implementing a system of regulation
by the grand lodges with others, `the effect of which his Lordship stated in
substance to be, to require that the objects and purposes of such lodges as
should be permitted to meet, should be declared to be purely masonic, and only
for the avowed objects of the institution, the principal ends of which he
conceived to be those of charity and benevolence; that the mode of certifying
should be, that two members of the lodge should make affidavit before two or
more magistrates of the particular place where the lodge was held, and of the
number and names of its members. That these accounts should be transmitted to
the clerk of the peace, who should, once a year at least, furnish a general
account of the whole within his district, to the magistrates sitting in quarter
sessions, who should be empowered, in case of well-founded complaints against
any particular lodge, to suppress its meetings'. The onus for regulation was
thus to be shifted from the grand lodges to the justices of the peace, who would
rely on certification by local lodges. All specific mention of the grand lodges
in the bill would be removed, and it would refer only to `the societies or
lodges of Free Masons'.

The Duke of Atholl agreed to accept
Grenville's compromise, and amendments in this form to the bill was passed,[xlv]
although Radnor still felt it necessary to enter in the Journal of the House of
Lords a formal protest against the exemptions for freemasonry.[xlvi]
The convoluted story of this piece of legislation was still, however, not
concluded. When the Lords' amendments were communicated to the Commons, it was
found that, by passing Grenville's new clauses, the Lords had exceeded their
authority. The Speaker observed that these amendments imposed new burdens on the
people, which was an exclusive privilege of the House of Commons. The only way
of dealing with this problem was to shelve the old bill and bring forward a new
one incorporating the revised clauses on freemasons, which would have to go
through the entire parliamentary procedure again. The new bill was therefore
brought forward later that day, and its process expedited, so that it received
the royal assent on 12 July.[xlvii]

The grand lodges energetically circularised
secretaries of lodges reminding them of their obligations under the act and
providing pre-printed forms for the necessary declarations and returns.[xlviii]
Chapters of the Royal Arch also received similar circulars.[xlix]
One odd side-effect of the hasty way in which the amendments had been passed was
that only lodges which existed before 12 July 1799 were protected by the
legislation.[l] This meant that the grand
lodges could not authorise new lodges, and had to resort to the expedient of
giving lodges the warrant and number of extinct lodges.[li]
The measures of the 1799 act were extended and refined by further legislation
against subversive clubs in 1817,[lii]
and it was assumed that this resolved the problem about new lodges, but many
years later this was found not to be the case.[liii]

The 1799 act was largely an exercise in
closing stable doors after horses had fled.[liv]
The United Irish were already regrouping into an even more secretive and
militaristic organisation.[lv]
London radicals resorted to holding informal tavern meetings which fell outside
the scope of the legislation.[lvi]
Even on occasions when the 1799 act might have been useful, other legislation
was used. For example, the 1799 act would have been applicable in the case of
the Tolpuddle Martyrs, who used oaths and rituals of initiation, and who sought
organise their `General Society of Labourers' as lodges under the jurisdiction
of a grand lodge.[lvii] However, the Tolpuddle
Martyrs were prosecuted under the 1797 Unlawful Oaths Act, not the 1799
legislation. Likewise, when prosecutions were brought against radical printers
such as Richard Carlile (who wrote his well-known Manual of Freemasonry while imprisoned at Dorchester), charges of
seditious libel or blasphemy were usually preferred.[lviii]
Later, the 1799 and 1817 acts were easily circumvented by chartist organisations,
which distributed advice on how to avoid prosecution under this legislation.[lix]

The
main legacy of the 1799 act was the various returns made to the clerk of the
peace. The returns of printers, continued until 1865 when the restrictions on
publications and reading rooms were lifted, are a vital source of information on
the history of provincial publishing.[lx]
The returns of freemasons, continued up to 1967 and still preserved in county
record offices, have been little used as a source of masonic history.[lxi]
The returns are probably fuller for the earlier nineteenth century than later;
in 1920 the London clerk of the peace estimated that only half the lodges made
returns.[lxii]
However, the 1799 act seems to have been appreciated by the Grand Lodges, which
perhaps felt that it gave them some standing in law and also provided a
potential means of proceeding against lodges acting irregularly.[lxiii]
In 1920, Grand Lodge circularised lodge secretaries reminding them to make their
returns, prompting the secretary of a lodge in Clapton to write to Lloyd George
urging him to repeal the old act.[lxiv]
A more serious problem arose in 1939, when the deputy clerk of the peace in
Essex wrote to lodges pointing out that only those founded before 12 July 1799
were entitled to exemption under the act. Counsel's opinion confirmed this view.
The United Grand Lodge of England sought to promote a private bill creating a
general exemption for freemasons from the act. The government was, however,
apprehensive about changing this legislation by private bill. A Home Office
official observed that the old act could still be useful against the I.R.A. and
Fascist organisations. In any case, in wartime there was no parliamentary time
for legislation of this kind. A compromise was agreed whereby the Attorney
General agreed not to prosecute any freemasons' lodges under theterms of the act, and clerks of the peace were asked to accept returns
without comment.[lxv]
Consequently, it was not only until the major criminal law reform of the 1967
Criminal Justice Act that the 1799 Unlawful Societies Act was finally repealed.[lxvi]

[iii]
The literature on the political and social conflicts of this period is
enormous. The following draws chiefly on: Marianne Elliott, Partners
in Revolution: The United Irishmen and France (New Haven and London: Yale
University Press, 1982); Albert Goodwin, The
Friends of Liberty: The English Democratic Movement in the Age of the French
Revolution (Cambridge, Ma.: Harvard University Press, 1979);Gwyn A. Williams, Artisans and
Sans-Culottes: Popular Movements in France and Britain during the French
Revolution, 2nd ed. (London: Libris, 1989); J. Ann Hone, For
the Cause of Truth: Radicalism in London 1796-1821 (Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1982); E. P. Thompson, The Making
of the English Working Class , 3rd ed. (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1980);
Clive Emsley, British Society and the French Wars 1793-1815 (London: Macmillan,
1979);Jennifer Mori, Britain
in the Age of the French Revolution (London: Longman, 2000);Clive Emsley, Britain and the
French Revolution(London:
Longman, 2000); Clive Emsley, `An aspect of Pitt's "Terror":
prosecutions for sedition during the 1790s', Social
History 6 (1981), pp. 155-184; Clive Emsley, `Repression,
"terror" and the rule of law in England during the decade of the
French Revolution', English Historical Review 100 (1985), pp. 801-825; Roger Wells, Insurrection:
The British Experience 1795-1803 (Gloucester: Alan Sutton, 1983);Iain McCalman, Radical Underworld:
Prophets, Revolutionaries and Pornographers in London 1795-1840
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988); Iain McCalman, `Ultra
Radicalism and convivial debating clubs in London, 1775-1838', English Historical Review 102 (1987), pp. 309-333; Edward Royle, Revolutionary
Britannia? Reflections on the Threat of Revolution in Britain, 1789-1848
(Manchester, Manchester University Press, 2000), pp. 1-66;Ehrman, op. cit., pp.
158-194, 277-316.

[v]
In the 1985 Book Club Associates edition of Stephen Knight, The
Brotherhood: The Secret World of the Freemasons (London: Guild Publishing,
1985), there is a statement on the first page that `Under the Unlawful
Societies Act of 1799 - unlikely, of course, ever to be enforced - Freemasons
are permitted to hold meetings only if yearly returns providing names,
addresses and descriptions of brethren are submitted to local Clerks of the
Peace. This is rarely done, so most gatherings in masonic lodges are held in
breach of this law'. This Act had been long repealed by the time Knight was
writing, so this is completely wrong, which doubtless explains why this
statement was withdrawn in the 1985 Panther Books reprint of this book,
although a reference to the Unlawful Societies Act still appears in the index.
Knight's reference to this act is a characteristic example of the way in which
he invariably attempts to put freemasonry in the worse possible light. He
attempts to suggest that the aim of the 1799 Act was to outlaw or regulate
freemasonry, whereas, as will be seen, the aim of the 1799 Act was to outlaw
such dangerous innovations as organisations with committees and elected
officers, and freemasonry was specifically exempted frrom this because it was
seen as presenting no threat.

[ix]
The reports of the secret committees were printed separately and widely
circulated. The report of the House of Commons committee is most conveniently
consulted in Commons' Journals 54
(1799), pp. 329-371, and Hansard's Parliamentary History, 34 (1799-1800), cols. 579-656. The secret
committee of the House of Lords reported on 27 May and the report can be found
in Lords' Journals 42 (1798-1800),
pp. 222-4, Parliamentary History34 (1799-1800), cols. 1000-1006, and The
Parliamentary Register, 3rd series, 9 (1799), pp. 524-531.

[xvii]
`A Bill for the more effectual suppression of societies established for
seditious and treasonable purposes; and for the prevention of other
treasonable and seditious practices'. The bill was presented by Sir Richard
Glyn, the Lord Mayor of London. It is reproduced in facsimile in Sheila
Lambert, House of Commons Sessional
Papers of the Eighteenth Century (Wilmington, Delaware: Scholarly
Resources Inc., 1975), 120 (Bills, 1798-9), no. 4934 (pp. 365-384).

[xxiv]Library and Museum of Freemasonry, Hall Committee Minute Books, no. 4
(1788-1813). The minute of the meeting of 30 April is as follows: `In
consequence of the Bill now in Parliament for the more effectual suppression
of seditious societies, which contained clauses that might materially affect
the existence of the Society, on account of its meetings being secret and the
administering of oaths, the Committee was convened to consider what could be
done to avert the danger with which the Society was threatened if the Bill
passed into a Law, when after the most mature deliberation it was resolved
that Mr [John] Dent be requested to ask the favor of the Right Honble William
Pitt, to receive a Deputation of the Society, in order to explain the nature
of it to him and its attachment to the Government of the Country, to express
its readiness to submit to any Regulations the Legislature might judge
necessary to prevent the name or meetings of the society being perverted to
any seditious purposes & to solicit a modification of the present clauses.
Mr Dent having left the committee, soon after sent a Letter, expressing that
he had seen Mr Pitt, at the House of Commons, who would be happy to receive a
deputation of the Society in Downing Street next Thursday morning at 11 o'clock.'The Hall Committee appointed the following as representatives of the
Moderns at the meeting: Lord Moira, Sir John Eames, Senior Grand Warden, Sir
Ralph Millbanke, MP, Rowland Burdon, MP, John Dent, MP, James Heseltine, Grand
Treasurer, Charles Marsh, George Downing, William White, Grand Secretary.

[xxv]
This meeting is noted by John Hamill, The Craft (London: Crucible, 1986), pp. 49-50, but the involvement
of other masonic representatives apart from Moira is not mentioned.

[xxvi]
Library and Museum of Freemasonry, Minutes of the Hall Committee, No. 4
(1788-1813), minutes of the meeting on 23 July 1799 (partly printed in Ars
Quatuor Coronatorum 93 (1980), p. 47. A short report of the outcome of the
meeting and the insertion of the exemption is in the Library and Museum of
Freemasonry, Antient Grand Lodge Minute Books, no. 4 (1796-1812), Grand Lodge
meeting 5 June 1799, `Upon hearing the report of the R.H. Deputy Grand Master
respecting the proceeedings relative to a Bill now pending in parliament for
the suppression of private meetings of societies and now containing a clause
granting a privilege to the Grand Lodge of Free Masons of England according to
the Old Constitutions and to all subordinate lodges under them to be exempted
from the penalties and operation of the said Act. It was resolved unanimously
that the thanks of the Grand Lodge be given to the R.W. Grand Master the Duke
of Atholl for his uniform and unremitting attention to the Honor and Interest
of the Ancient Craft and particularly for his care and extertions in the
instance of the bill now pending in parliament from the operation of which the
Ancient Craft is by a clause in the said bill exempted'. This minute predates
Atholl's vigorous defence of freemasonry in the House of Lords.

[xxvii]
Printed from the Historical Correspondence files at the Library and Museum of
Freemasonry by T. O. Haunch, in his comment on H. H. Solf, `The Origin and
Sources of the Schroeder Ritual', Ars Quatuor Coronatorum 92 (1979), p. 100.

[xxviii]
The letter in which Moira made this declaration is printed in full in David
Murray Lyon, History of the Lodge of
Edinburgh embracing an account of the Rise and Progress of Freemasonry in
Scotland (Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood, 1873), p. 266

[xxxv]
This is from the bill as sent to the House of Lords following its third
reading by the Commons, which is reproduced in facsimile in F. William
Torrington, House of Lords Sessional
Papers Session 1798-9 (New York: Oceana Publications, 1974), 1, pp.
199-218. The exemptions initially proposed by Pitt initially covered only the
two English Grand Lodges, and the exemption for the Scottish Grand Lodge was
only added when the committee stage of the bill was reported to the commons on
8 May: The Senator 23 (1799), p.
1465 (the reports in The Senator at
this point appear more circumstantial and reliable than those in The
Parliamentary Register, 3rd series 8 (1799), p. 556, which suggests that
the committee had inserted exemptions only for the Antients, and that the
exemptions for both the Moderns and Scottish Grand Lodge were added only when
the committee stage of the bill was reported). Gould, op.
cit., 4, p. 487, citing Lyon, op.
cit., p. 267, notes that the bill was `much modified in its passage
through Committee', but does not attempt to trace details. Lyon's account
confuses matters by considering the insertion of the reference to Scottish
Grand Lodge only in the context of the dispute between the Scottish Grand
Lodge and Mother Kilwinning. He refers (pp. 266-7) to a remonstrance sent by
the Lodge of Kilwinning to William Fullarton, the MP for Ayrshire, which
protested about the fact that the bill referred only to the Grand Lodge in
Edinburgh, while `another, more ancient and equally respectable, and
remarkable for its attachment to the laws and constitution of the country (the
Lodge of Kilwinning) was taken no notice of'. Mother Kilwinning assumed that
this omission sprang from ignorance on Pitt's part, and requested Fullarton
`to make the necessary application, and through the proper channel, to have
that lodge, and those holding charters from her, likewise exempted from the
operations of this Bill'. Lyon suggests that the removal of the specific
references to the Grand Lodges from the Act was due to this intervention on
the part of Mother Kilwinning, but in fact, as is shown below, the removal of
the references to the Grand Lodges in the House of Lords was due to doubts
about the propriety of the proposed system of self-regulation. It seems likely
that Fullarton took no notice of the remonstrance from Mother Kilwinning.
There is no record of his speaking in any of the debates. Alternatively, he
may have raised the matter privately with the government, and they may have
refused to extend the exemptions.

[xl]
The fullest report of this debate is in The Senator 23 (1799), pp. 1728-1732, and all quotations are taken
from this account unless otherwise stated. Another report is The
Parliamentary Register, 3rd series, 9 (1799), pp. 26-8.

[xli]
The Complete Peerage, 10, p. 718
note d, cites a description of Lord Radnor by Beckford: `...queer looking
punctilious...that Grand Borer after forms and precedents in the House of
Lords and Dictator at Quarter Sessions and Turnpike meetings, by way of
relaxation in the Country...cross grained, close fisted and a notorious driver
after hard bargains...'

[xliii]
The Times report of the debate is
partially printed by W. Sharman in his comment on M. Brodsky, `Some
Reflections on the Origins of the Royal Arch', Ars Quatuor Coronatorum 102
(1989), pp. 128-9. He also mentions the comments of the Duke of Norfolk during
the committee stage in the House of Lords.

[xliv]The Parliamentary Register, 3rd
series 9 (1799), p. 27, which suggests that Grenville introduced the amended
clauses in order to rescue the situation after Radnor's amendment had been
passed. The more precise account in The
Senator, however, suggests that Grenville's compromise had been put
forward before a vote was taken, and that Radnor's amendment was carried in
order to allow Grenville's new clauses to be added to the bill as riders.

[xlv]Lords' Journals 42 (1798-1800), p.
277. The Duke of Atholl's role in successfully defending freemasonry as a
whole in this debate has been largely forgotten, and most of the credit has
been given instead to Lord Moira. On 5 September 1799, the Antient Grand Lodge
recognised Atholl's contribution by passing the following resolution: `that
the thanks of the R.W. Grand Lodge be given to the Most Noble Prince the Duke
of Atholl et co. et co. R. W. Grand Master for his very sincere uniform and
unremitting attention to the honor and interest of the ancient craft and
particularly for his care and attendance during the progress of the bill
lately pending in parliament by whose extertions alone the Ancient Free Masons
of this kingdom are indebted for the privilege and benefit of holding their
meetings in conformity to the rules and orders of the said fraternity and that
the same be fairly transcribed and transmitted to his Grace in the most
respectful manner': Library and Museum of Freemasonry, Antient Grand Lodge
Minutes, no. 4 (1796-1812) (partly printed in J. R. Clarke, op. cit., p. 269). This minute is followed by a further vote of
thanks to the Deputy Grand Master of the Antients: `Resolved unanimously that
the thanks of the RW Grand Lodge be given to Wm Dickey Esqre RW Deputy Grand
Master and the rest of the Grand Officers now present for their uniform and
steady attention to the honor and interest of the ancient craft particularly
during the progress of the bill lately depending in parliament and the
exigence of the present times.' The failure sufficiently to acknowledge
Atholl's role in saving freemasonry in Britain from extinction seems to have
rankled with the Antients. In 1802, following the collapse of negotiations for
a union, various pamphlets attacking the Antients were distributed in London,
including a reprint of resolutions passed against the Ancients by the Modern
Grand Lodge in 1777. Robert Leslie, the Grand Secretary of the Ancients, wrote
a furious letter to the Master of an Antient lodge in Peterborough about the
reappearance of these resolutions: `I was wholly ignorant that the records in
Queen Street contained any such personalities and reflections against His
Grace the Duke of Atholl or so much rancour against our Grand Lodge. His
Graces Conduct in Parliament when he recently and nobly defended the
Principles of Ancient as well as Modern Masonry Merited no such New
insult as the Republication and delivery of the above Letters: and if such
Rancour remained upon the Records of the Grand Lodge in Queen St it ought then
if not long before been blotted out or buried in oblivion.': R. Leslie to
Worshipful Master and Wardens of Antients Lodge No. 160, 16 September 1802:
Library and Museum of Freemasonry, Returns (SN 1600).

[xlvi]Ibid.: `DISSENTIENTE. Because I
cannot think it becomes the wisdom of any legislature, at any time, to
recognise a society whose numbers, members, motives, tenets and pursuits are
unknown to it, and studiously concealed, especially when concealed through the
medium of oaths administered by assumed and therefore (in my opinion) unlawful
authority; and much less that it becomes the prudence of this House to do so,
at a time when it is notorious that the supposed obligation of such oaths has
been the actual mean of the mischiefs which the societies suppressed by this
bill have effected, and been endeavouring, as asserted by this bill, to effect
in Ireland; and when it is still more notorious, that societies (the same in
their origin, profession and their name) have been the instrument, by means of
such oaths, and such secrecy, of shaking to their foundation, in a
considerable part of Europe, every establishment, civil and ecclesiastical.
The present innocency of this society, as existing in Great Britain, asserted
in debate, but not proved (and for my part believed, but not known) ought not,
in my opinion, even though it had been proved or known to have been the
pretext for disfiguring so salutory a bill by an exception, and this a
permanent exception, in its favour; since it is evident that the essential
secrecy of the Society of Free Masons has a natural tendency to facilitate
treasonable and seditious practices; and since it is historically true that it
has already been the instrument of giving such practices effect to an
unexampled extent. RADNOR'.

[xlvii]Commons' Journals 54 (1798-9), pp.
712-6, 720, 723, 728; Lords' Journals 42
(1798-1800), pp. 317-8, 322, 324; The Parliamentary Register, 3rd series 9 (1799), p. 82; The
Senator 23 (1799), p. 1793. It is striking that the Lords finally passed
the bill against unlawful societies on the same day that they passed the
Combination Acts - both pieces of legislation were apparently prompted by the
government's concern to suppress large organisations administering oaths and
run by elected officials, which were regarded as a frightening new political
development.

[xlviii]
On 30 July 1799, the Modern Grand Lodge issued a communication from the Grand
Master to all Masters of lodges, reprinting the terms of the act and providing
a pro-forma for making the return. Similar forms were issued by Ancient Grand
Lodge. The circular issued by the Grand Lodge of Scotland is reproduced in
Alexander Lawrie, The History of
Freemasonry (Edinburgh: Alex
Lawrie, 1804), pp. 270-7. In 1801, J. Modern wrote to William White, the Grand
Secretary of the Moderns, asking if Anchor and Hope lodge, Bolton, might meet,
as the Clerk of the Peace had refused to accept the annual return of members
on the grounds that it was two or three days late: Library and Museum of
Freemasonry, Historical Correspondence, 4/A/11.

[xlix]
On 24 August 1799, Benjamin Cooper, the Grand Recorder, circularised Royal
Arch chapters as follows: `Excellent Companion, The following sheet having
been sent to every lodge of freemasons in England, I send you a copy thereof,
and on the other page you will find a form for registering your chapter, which
you must cause to be filled up and delivered within the time limited, or you
can no longer be allowed to meet.': Public Record Office, CHES 38/30.

[l]
A point noted by Lawrie, op. cit.,
p. 145, who noted that `the progress of Free Masonry in Britain was retarded
by an act of parliament in 1799, in which the fraternity was virtually
prohibited from erecting new lodges in the kingdom'. Lawrie goes on to point
out, however, that `the exemptions which [the legislation] contained in favour
of Free Masons, are a complete proof that government never credited the
reports of these alarmists; but placed the most implicit confidence in the
loyalty and prudence of British masons' (loc.cit.)

[li]
This is discussed fully in J. M. Hamill, `English Grand Lodge Warrants part
1', Ars Quatuor Coronatorum 90
(1977), pp. 104-6.See also
Gould, op. cit., 4, pp. 452, 487.
The restriction lead to a flood of enquiries between 1800 and 1803 to the
Grand Lodges about the procedure for setting up new lodges and obtaining
warrants from dormant lodges: se e.g. Library and Museum of Freemasonry,
Historical Correspondence, 1/F/13, 4/A/19, 5/B/4, 5/H/4, 5/H/10, 6/C/12,
6/C/16-17, 7/6/67. The inconvenience caused by this was considerable, and in
1803, Henry Jennet, the Provincial Grand Master of the Moderns for Bristol,
wrote to the Grand Secretary, William White, urging him to `get the
restrictions taken from their Society and be again allowed to grant
constitutionwarrants': Library
and Museum of Freemasonry, Historical Correspondence, 3/A/8.

[lii]
57 Geo. III c. 19 (clause 26 contains the exemption for freemasons, which was
also extended to the Quakers and other religious meetings). The legislation is
briefly noted in Gould, op. cit., 4,
p. 487.

[liv]
However, it should be noted that other organisations which had a ritual
component were not as fortunate as the freemasons. The Home Office files
include a number of documents describing the constitution of the United Order
of Odd Fellows, suggesting that special attention was paid to them in April
1799: Public Record Office HO 42/47, ff. 180-192. These include a copy of `The
General Laws of the Noble Order of Odd Fellows', in which every reference to
the use of secret words and signs or any kind of ritual has been struck
through, suggesting that the Home Office put pressure on the Odd Fellows to
discontinue such practices.

[lvii]
Rex v. Lovelass and others: 6 Car. & P. 596-601; S.C.1 Moody & Rob.
349. One of the witnesses in the case described the ritual as follows: `He
asked if we were all ready. Some one answered, that we were; and he said,
then, blind your eyes. We then all tied our hankerchiefs round our eyes, and
being thus blindfolded, we were led into another room, where something was
read to us by some person whom I did not know. I think, from the reading of
it, it was out of the Bible; I don't recollect any part of it. We then knelt
down, when a book was put in our hands, and an oath administered to us. I
don't recollect what the oath was about. We then rose up and were unblinded,
when the picture of death, or a skeleton, was shewn to us, upon which the
prisoner James Lovelass said `Remember your end!' We were then blinded again,
and again knelt down, when something was read out of a paper, but what it was
I don't remember. I kissed a book when I was unblinded first. I saw George
Lovelass dressed in white; he had on him something like a parson's surplice'.
The trade union was to be organised on masonic lines: `there should be a lodge
in every parish, a committee, a grand lodge, and contributions to support
those who quit their work when desired by grand lodge'.

[lx]
Morgan, op. cit., and`English Provincial Imprints, 1799-1869',
The Library, 5th series 21 (1966), pp. 60-2. The regulations on printers
had been largely forgotten by the 1830s and were an occasional source of
irritation to publishers and authors threatened with prosecution under
legislation they had never heard of: see e.g. Public Record Office...The
regulations on printers were largely repealed in 1869 by 32 & 33 Vict c
24, although the requirements still in force today for the printers name and
address to appear on the title page, and for printers to keep an archive of
their publications, are rooted in the 1799 legislation.Paul Morgan points out (`English Provincial Imprints', p. 60) that the
central register kept by the Home Office was destroyed in 1897 `on the grounds
that the actual notices were filed with the Clerks of the Peace who granted
the certificates'. However, in some cases the Clerks of the Peace did not
retain the returns, so that this vital information for the history of
provincial printing has disappeared. The Printers' Registrations for
Warwickshire have been edited by Paul Morgan, Warwickshire
Printers' Notices, ed. cit. The Printers Registration for Northumberland,
Cumberland and the West Riding of Yorkshire have been tabulated by the History
of the Book Trade in the North group: PH6 (March 1966), PH13 (1967) and PH 66
(1994).

[lxi]
Honourable exceptions include W. Sharman, `Early Jewish Masons in the Province
of Northumberland', Ars Quatuor
Coronatorum 100 (1987), p. 231. Family historians have,
characteristically, shown much greater interest in the returns: see e.g. Pat
Lewis, My Ancestor Was a Freemason
(London: Society of Genealogists, 1999). Many lists of quarter session
records, including brief lists of surviving returns, are now being made
available online by county record offices as part of the Access to Archives
project: www.a2a.gov.uk. However, most of the listings are of files of
returns. It is possible that the original returns may not have been
systematically kept, and that the enrolled returns are more comprehensive. The
interest of these returns is nevertheless apparent from an inspection of the
Access to Archives list of 1799 returns in the WR/SF series of the London
Metropolitan Archives, Westminster Quarter Sessions records. These include the
returns of the Ancients Grand Lodge (WR/SF/1799/15), the Modern grand Lodge
(WR/SF/1799/16) and the Modern Grand Chapter (WR/SF/1799/16). While there are
some returns from bodies thart cannot be readily identified in Lane, such as
WR/SF/1799/10, from `Lodge no. 5 meeting at the King's Arms Tavern, Palace
Yard, Westminster', other Westminster lodges apparently made no return, such
as the Lodge of Stability, no. 217, and St Andrew's Lodge, no. 231.

[lxii]
Public Record Office, HO 45/18359. According to H. Mendoza, `The Articles of
Union and the Orders of Chivalry', Ars Quatuor Coronatorum 93 (1980), pp. 63-4, for some time before
the repeal of the act, Royal Arch Chapters had stopped making returns,
considering presumably that the craft lodge certificate covered them.

[lxiii]
This is particularly evident in Scotland where the 1799 act provided the Grand
Lodge with means to take legal action against seceding lodges: Lyon, op.
cit., pp. 264-80. These prosecutions were unsuccessful. In England, the
curious pride taken in the passing of the exemptions is evident in, for
example, the insertion on lodge certificates of slogans such as `Masonry
Universal Sanctioned by Parliament 1799': Ars
Quatuor Coronatorum, 93 (1980), p. 47. J. Hamill comments on Sir James
Stubbs's Prestonian lecture `The Government of the Craft' that the Grand
Lodges `only managed to succeed in extracting regular annual returns from home
lodges by the assistance of the 1799 Unlawful Societies Act which enabled them
threaten lodges with the withdrawal of their warrants if they did not comply
with the regulations concerning annual returns and registrations'. Stubbs in
reply commented `I wish I had thought of using the 1799 Act before Lord
Scarman's committee got rid of it as a threat to dilatory Lodge Secretaries
though in fact the gentle threat of being reported to the Board of General
Purposes was generally sufficient': Ars
Quatuor Coronatorum, 95 (1982), p. 77.

[lxiv]
Public Record Office, HO 45/18359: letter from Frank Orfleur, secretary of the
Clapton lodge, no. 1365, to David Lloyd George, 29 April 1920.

[lxv]
Public Record Office, HO 45/18359; FS 23/259; LCO 2/1223. Another copy of the
`Freemasons Lodges Bill' of 1939 is in the Library and Museum of Freemasonry,
Great Queen Street.

[lxvi]
As late as 1965, a detailed explanation of why lodge secretaries had to make
annual returns to the Clerk of the Peace appeared in Ars
Quatuor Coronatorum 78 (1965), pp. 276-7.